Current and historic US highway endpoints in Apalachicola, FL
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1933-present
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In 1933, Florida managed to get two new intra-state US routes approved, both of them terminating in Apalachicola. From that city, US 98 went west, ending in Pensacola. US 319 went the opposite direction, gradually curving to the north, ending in Tallahassee (the US 19 designation had been extended south from Tallahassee in 1930, so it made sense to number the road to Apalachicola as a branch of US 19). Initially US 319 included a ferry segment between Apalachicola and Eastpoint:
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c. 1935, Gousha
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However, since the original Gorrie Bridge opened in 1935, it certainly was at least in the planning stage (if not already under construction) when these two US routes were commissioned... making it likely that the new bridge was one of the primary factors prompting Florida to seek a US route designation to Apalachicola.
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c. 1939, Rand McNally
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So why wasn't the entire corridor (Tallahassee-Pensacola) simply given a single US route number (rather than two different designations sharing a common terminus in Apalachicola)? Possibly because of the signed direction of travel. Obviously US 98 between Pensacola and Apalachicola is east-west. But, even though one could argue that US 319 between Apalachicola and today's US 98-319 junction east of Carrabelle could also be signed east-west, US 319 from that junction up to Tallahassee has a strong north-south bearing.
So when US 98 and US 319 both ended in Apalachicola, where exactly did they terminate? The earliest map I have seen is this 1940s topo, shown here alternating with a modern basemap, in order to compare the alignment of the original bridge to the modern bridge approach: |
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It is not clear where the original transition point between US 98 and US 319 was located, but one possibility is the Franklin County courthouse on Market Street.
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In 1952, the US 98 designation was extended to its current terminus in Palm Beach. To get there, it overlapped US 319 for over 30 miles to the east, so a case could be made that US 319 should be truncated to the junction where it separates from US 98 (between Carrabelle and Sopchoppy). While that has not been done, US 319 has been truncated by about one mile. The map above illustrates the point where the new bridge alignment veers to the south of the original alignment (at far right)... and that is precisely the point where the US 319 designation ends today:
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Cozart, Dec. 2003
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That was looking west; Apalachicola is on the far side of the bridge, about a mile distant. The original bridge went straight ahead, but here (where the current bridge makes a slight curve to the left) is where US 319's "End" assembly is posted. Heading the opposite direction, there is a "Begin" sign at the eastern foot of the Gorrie Bridge:
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Cozart, Dec. 2003
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Eastpoint is about four miles ahead (within about one year, the vegetation shown in those photos was severely reduced, thanks to Hurricane Ivan). What an odd place for a route designation to terminate: it makes no sense for US 319 to be overlapped with US 98 for 30 miles, only to end at this non-descript point.
Research and/or photo credits: Justin Cozart; Larry McDonald; Dale Sanderson
Page originally created 1999;
last updated July 1, 2016.
last updated July 1, 2016.
